Hi everyone, this is AJ with a quick update for Learn Real English. Kristin, Joe, and I are now all back home in San Francisco and ready to do more work! One of the first things we'll be working on is the Learn Real English Podcast.   All three of us will begin adding podcast episodes soon (starting in May)... so you'll get to hear all of our voices  In the podcast, we'll talk about real English conversation and how it is different than school English or the formal English you learned from textbooks.   We'll also discuss our teaching methods and our future projects. Of course, the most powerful thing about Learn Real English is that these lessons teach you "real conversation"--  the everyday idioms, slang, pronunciation, grammar, and vocabulary used by regular people in regular conversations.   This "real English" is remarkably different than the formal English you have studied in school.    The grammar is different (much looser and more flexible), the vocabulary is different (much more slang, more idioms), the pronunciation is different. Syntax is also much different--  in other words, the way we create spoken English sentences is very different than the way we create written English sentences.  Most English teachers in most schools in the world actually teach their students to speak WRITTEN English--  a very formal and rigid style of English. But native speakers, in fact, use a very fast, flexible, fluid form of spoken English.   We rarely use complete sentences, we change topics often, we interrupt and are interrupted, we pause, we create new words and new contractions, we ignore many so-called grammar "rules". So, if your goal is to speak real English to real people, it's time for you to learn real English conversation.   Get our lessons, read this blog, and starting in May, listen to our new podcast-- and you will improve quickly! --AJ